UK house prices remain stable apart from London, says Nationwide

UK house prices climbed slowly in September as properties in London continued to see their value decline, according to data released on Tuesday by mortgage lender Nationwide.

The building society’s house price index showed 2% year-on-year growth for houses across Britain, roughly unchanged from August’s rate of annual increase and matching the slowest pace of growth in the last five years. Between August and September average house prices grew by 0.3% to £214,922.

Robert Gardner, Nationwide's chief economist, said: “Subdued economic activity and ongoing pressure on household budgets is likely to continue to exert a modest drag on housing market activity and house price growth this year, though borrowing costs are likely to remain low.”

Gardner added that he expected house prices to rise by approximately 1% over the course of 2018.

Average prices saw an annual 0.7% fall in London, a 0.3% drop in the city’s outer metropolitan area and a 1.7% annual decrease in the North, currently the UK’s least expensive region.

Though they experienced a drop, London properties remain just 3% below their all-time high, which was reached in early 2017, and remain more than 50% more expensive than they were in 2007.

On the positive side of things Yorkshire and Humberside emerged as the strongest performing region in the UK, with prices up 5.8% year on year, while the East Midlands continued to see relatively strong growth, with prices increasing 4.8% year-on-year.

Meanwhile, Northern Ireland saw its prices rise 4.3% and both Scotland and Wales’ growth rates slowed, from 3.1% in 2017 to 2.1% for 2018 in Scotland and down slightly to 3.3% in Wales.

Samuel Tombs, market analyst at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said: “As in 2016, prospective buyers increasingly will hold back from making purchases until the threat of a no-deal Brexit in March 2019 has been expunged. Accordingly, the housing market likely will remain subdued for at least the next six months.”

Prior to the UK’s referendum vote on the EU, house prices had been increasing at an annual rate of around 5%.